208
VOYAGES
A N D DISCOVERIES OF
Every one was more or less affected by these calamities ; even the veterans of the colony quailed beneath them ; but to none were they more fatal than to the crowd of youthful cavaliers who had once glittered so gayly about the streets of Seville, and had come out to the New "World elated with the most sanguine expec足 tations.
From the very moment of their landing they had been
disheartened at the savage scenes around them, and disgusted with the squalid life they were doomed to lead.
They shrunk with
disdain from the labors with which alone wealth was to be pro足 cured in this land of gold and pearls, and were impatient of the humble exertions necessary for the maintenance of existence. As the famine increased, their case became desperate ; for they were unable to help themselves, and their rank and dignity com足 manded neither deference nor aid at a time when common misery made every one selfish.
Many of them, who had mortgaged
estates in Spain to fit themselves out sumptuously for their Italian campaign, now perished for lack of food.
Some would be seen
bartering a robe of crimson silk, or some garment of rich brocade, for a pound of Indian bread or European biscuit ; others sought to satisfy the cravings of hunger with the herbs and roots of the field, and one of the principal cavaliers absolutely expired of hunger in the public streets. In this wretched way, and in the short space of one month, perished seven hundred of the little army of youthful and buoy足 ant spirits who had embarked with Pedrarias.
The bodies of
some remained for a day or two without sepulture, their friends not having sufficient strength to bury them.
Unable to remedy
the evil, Pedrarias gave permission for his men to flee from it. A ship-load of starving adventurers departed for Cuba, where some of them joined the standard of Diego Velasquez, who was